The team evades a group of guards and sneaks through the processing facility. As they are exploring they spot a visiting Russian officer named Major Grigorievich, a known associate of Duke Volkov. They locate a holding area with several cells crowded with refugees and other prisoners. They stealthily dispose of the Russian Thralls who are guarding the captives and free them and give them an opening to escape the place. The act of opening the cells sets off an alert that begins to draw reinforcements to the area. Fanya checks an overseer’s console and determines that Tashka, her friend, is being held in a testing lab upstairs.

Going up a stairwell to the labs level, the Knights confront a force of Russian soldiers, including some of Grigorievich’s personal guard. The battle ranges through a few rooms where experimental materials and prototypes are stored, with the narrow passages resulting in close combat between the heroes and their foes. Several Komar drones - insectile blood-sucking robots - appear to assist the Thrall guards, but during the fight a dangerous entity known as an “Aishan” breaks out of the nano-tech lab.

The Aishan is a ghost-like being formed from the pain energy expunged by occultech devices, and in its anger it targets the facilities’ guards for destruction with its power over electronic devices. The Knights manage to avoid earning its ire due to their relative lack of technological devices, and it ends up wiping out a large number of Thralls and drones as it walks through the bloody corridor. The heroes advance to the end of the passage and enter a testing chamber where they discover Tashka being put through some painful experiment by the Tharkoldu in charge of the facility, Sornomos. The test is being observed by Major Grigorievich and several human Thralls of the technodemon.

Sigma is able to taunt and intimidate the scientifically-minded Sornomos, and the technodemon attacks the Knights rashly, leaving himself open to carefully targeted attacks by Olivia and William. Several of the technician thralls leap to their master’s defense, but to little avail. Oswyn confronts the sinister Grigorievich in single combat, trading blows the officer around the dangerous energy projectors in the testing room. With a gory wound to his skull leaving him badly wounded, Sornomos is finished off by the hate-filled Aishan, which fries the technodemon’s implants and dissipates as it scatters itself through the wiring of the facility, burning out most of the building’s lighting and electronics.

Retreating from the fight, Grigorievich takes the partially-transformed Tashka with him to a helipad and boards a Russian Hind helicopter transport. Fanya chases after them and is able to leap aboard the chopper, confronting the Major and more of his soldiers inside.

Thinking quickly, Olivia is able to send an energy discharge from the testing chamber at the Hind, causing its systems to shut down in mid-air. The party watches as the helicopter spins out and crashes in an explosion below the facility towers.

XP: 5 (165)

Deal with the Devil - Act II

Cyra, the Resistance fighter, arrives on the scene with a force of Race soldiers who come to respond to the downfall of Sornomos and the processing facility. They set about aiding the escapees and Storm Knights. The heroes and Cyra experience a torturous vision of the U.N. in Geneva being attacked by a harrowing force, indicating that the vote on Russia taking place there may be endangered by agents of Tharkold.

Olivia heads to the downed chopper with her jetpack, narrowly getting Fanya to safety from the wreckage. She discovers that Tashka and Grigorievich also survived and are escaping to a strange train on the outskirts of the toxic bog surrounding Sornomos’ prison. Fanya’s leg is badly injured and she is unable to go with the Storm Knights as they pursue the Major and the test-subject. The team leaves her in the care of Cyra and her Resistance cell, taking some convenient dirtbikes to speed after the Tharkold train as it leaves the area headed west.

Easily catching up with the techno-organic train, the Knights leap on top of it and begin working on breaking into its grotesque engine car. Oswyn cuts away a section of the fleshy carapace covering the train, and he holds open a hole for Olivia and Kash to leap in through. William, Sigma, and Oswyn defend against a group of Thralls who come out onto the outside of the train to try and stop the Storm Knights.

Inside the engine, Kash and Olivia use a mix of faith and science to free some comatose Thralls who are powering the engine with their agonies. When the last of them is freed, the train runs out of energy and slows down to a halt, stopping amidst some mountains of rubble in the wasteland.

Major Grigorievich exits the stalled train to confront the Storm Knights, accompanied by a fully-transformed Tashka, who now looks like a ghostly projection arrayed in some sort of futuristic armor.

The Knights confront Tashka and Grigorievich in a junkyard filled with towering rubble from shattered buildings. The Major and two of his surviving soldiers hang back and attack from cover while the transformed Tashka - possessed by some extra-dimensional evil - uses one spell to teleport herself closer to the team and then amps her reaction speed with another. Olivia and William are able to spot a stabilizer device in the collar of the carapace that the demonic Tashka is wearing, and they call it out to the others as a potential weak spot.

Sigma summons a spell to draw off some of the power in the carapace’s exoskeleton, weakening Tashka as the others move in. Kash calls for the blessing of Lanala to enhance the accuracy of his friend’s attacks, William fires on her with his heavy pistol, destroying her rifle, and Oswyn leaps down from a pile of debris to strike at her with his sword. The paladin of Dunad and the heavily armored monster clash and exchange powerful blows, neither breaking through their foe’s defenses.

Kash and Olivia then focus on dealing with the Russian Thralls as the soldiers try to flank the melee happening in the center of the junkpile. The Terran gadgeteer tricks the Thralls with a canister packed with dirt which they mistake for a bomb, causing them to flee from the combat and leave Grigorievich to defend himself.

The Knights are able to break the stabilizer collar on Tashka’s carapace, shattering the armor and exposing what turns out to be an incredibly resilient skeletal exoskeleton remotely controlled by the possessed woman from somewhere nearby. While Olivia continues to harass the wily Grigorievich around the ruins, the rest focus on trying to finally subdue the composite monster.

William is able to find a device in the piles of debris that interferes with the creature’s functions, and Sigma, Kash, and Oswyn continue to harass Tashka with slashers, tail, and sword. After maneuvering around the confused and weakened enemy, they set up Oswyn for a final blow which shatters the cybernetic exoskeleton and scatters the otherworldly spirit which was inhabiting it. A malestrom forms around the combatants, whipping red and blue possibility energy through the junkyard. The resulting explosion of occultech and reality energy sends out a concussion wave that knocks the heroes backward and shatters some of the free-standing wreckage. Glory near Vyazma, Tharkold.

Grigorievich ends up alive but beneath a pile of rock and steel, pinned in place by the rubble. The Storm Knights take the corrupt officer into custody and seek out Tashka’s physical body, locating it in a chamber of the bio-organic “pain train”. They break her out of the grotesque train car and tend to her as the Resistance forces arrive on the scene. Fanya is reunited with her beloved friend, and it is hoped that the cybernetically modified Tashka will be able to recover from the experience and adapt to the occultech that Sornomos’ implanted in her.

Olivia and Kash escort Grigorievich out of Tharkold and across Europe to Geneva, where they are able to present him and evidence of Volkov’s war crimes to the United Nations. The resolution to classify Russia as a collaborator with the enemies of Core Earth passes, intensifying the offensive against Tharkold and its demonic masters.

The Edeinos and the Terran hero meet with an Aylish representative of the U.N. named Masoof after the vote, discussing the fallout of the decision. They are cautiously optimistic about the ability of Core Earth to work together to beat back Volkov and the other Dukes of Tharkold, and she says that Queen Ardinay has pledged to help receive the refugees from the Blasted Lands in Scandinavia. As they are speaking together, Father Scolari of the Cyberpapacy enters Masoof’s office, interrupting with a request for aid from the Storm Knights.

Showing the group gruesome crime scene photos, Scolari explains that the former Cardinal Babin has now become a heretical foe of the Church following a public transformation into a werewolf some weeks past. The cybernetically-enhanced beast has rampaged across France and killed many officers of the Church Police before disappearing somewhere in the Canavese region of northwest Italy. According to reports, Babin has gathered followers who now share his curse and also transform into bloodthirsty werewolves on nights of the full moon. The Cyberpapacy now requests that William and his fellow Knights could help them find and destroy Babin and his inhuman acolytes.

Meanwhile, back in a Resistance base located in the Blasted Lands, William is attempting to instruct the former Thralls of Thratchen in the finer points of warfare. As his texts are Victorian in origin, they include some anachronistic principles such as the “hollow square”. The ex-Thralls elect a leader named Vladimir to ask their teacher about these things and their effectiveness against the tactics of Tharkoldu. Sigma observes with amusement and curiosity, and he talks with the vampyre hunter about the worldview of natives of his realm, getting William to concede that he will need to adjust his lesson plan.

Oswyn is teaching many of the Resistance soldiers and the refugees in the base about the ways of the Gods of Light, particularly his patron deity of Dunad and the origins of his power. He hopes to convert some of them to his faith, but Cyra approaches him with skepticism. She shows him a mural depicting the faces of many Race and Earth people lost in the ongoing war against the technodemons, cautioning him against promising too much to desperate people. He speaks lovingly of Aysle’s greener places and says that he plans to return there - perhaps bringing some converts with him.

With three Glories accomplished during their current trip to Eastern Europe, the Storm Knights decide to focus on trying to uproot one of the stelae in the vicinity of Estonia. Expecting a bitter fight against Duke Volkov’s defense forces, they begin discussing their plan of attack….

The ones I came up with were not as EXTREME!!! as all that, but were still real tough - I wanted to try an opponent with the suggested Beta Clearance skill range, but high defenses + high armor = long, drawn out combat. I ended up fudging the creature's Wounds to wrap things up after the Glory:

I apologize for my lack of correspondence these past few months, as you do know my work tends to keep me burning both ends of the candle so that I can rarely find these few moments to write to you. To respond to your previous letter of inquiry, Harrison has vanished; my brother's visage gone for the eons of time for a second time in my life. I cannot tell you how I wish to fall to my knees, and weep as you bear witness to the baring of my soul.

There are few times which I can truly express myself with a cool head as we stand facing the evil forces of the Gauntman and his nefarious fiends. We have had two new gentlemen join us; Sir Oswyn, Knight by the fae court, and a man born of both science and God's rightful hand. They are both righteous individuals who have proven themselves time and again. I would not trade them, even to have my brother back. I also have sad tidings to mention: my Cousin has had a rather dramatic exit from the world's stage. I cannot tell you how many times he performed as such in your youth.

I do hope your brother Edger is well, and that your Father has finally shaken the debt mark from his shoulders. I hope that you do not mind that the lock of your hair which you enclosed in your last letter is tightly encased within my waistcoat pocket. It truly lightens my steps at every evil I face, the memory of the darkened tresses which cascade down over your shoulders, brushing over your ebony skin. I confess I may have exposed far too much in my own words to you my Dearest, but do understand that a not a day goes by without you upon the back of my mind.

The knights go to Naissaar in an attempt to find and prepare for pulling the Stela there. They find out a lot of useful information, about what the Tharkoldu were doing here, the location of the Stela, and details on the security.

Exploring the Island:

The island has been changed by Volkov’s people into a largely barren and polluted industrial site, with its historic lighthouse one of the few things remaining from the pre-Invasion past.

There are three large pipelines crossing the island from north to south; they transport oil shale gathered from the Gulf of Finland.

A building on the western shore is where the shale is processed into oil by Thralls under a cruel overseer. The Knights knock the overseer out and William adopts his guise to deal with a call from a Russian officer.

There is a bear-like abomination that feeds on the toxic run-off and is used as a sort of unofficial guard by Volkov’s people. The Knights come across it during their travels across the island, and they work together to destroy it after it tries to ambush them from a toxic pool. It is quickly defeated by their devastating attacks.

A dockyard on the eastern shore is where Russian Navy vessels pick up and transport oil drums. It is more heavily guarded.

The Stela they plan to uproot is near the lighthouse, placed in the middle of an open field that is seeded with Gospog. Tampering with it will wake all of them.

Planning:

Olivia set up a pre-timed steam vent test from the processing building as a distraction for the upcoming raid.

William, in overseer guise, convinces the Thralls to take a large load of oil drums from the processing building to the Gospog field. The hope is to set the oil aflame and destroy the Gospog before they can become a threat.

Oswyn is acquainted with a mercenary Viking chieftain from Aysle named Tharvald. He uses his Connection to get some Vikings to help with the assault on the island.

The group gets the Estonian Navy to agree to help with mining the Gulf, hoping to hold off Russian Navy ships from assisting the island.

They ask Antonin Dufek, a decker from the Cyberpapacy, to help deal with drones and computer security on the island. He will need access to terminals at either the docks or the processing building.

Cyra’s Resistance group will assist the Knights with some soldiers that will accompany them on the island.

mathey wrote:They were, frankly, broken. I had half-assedly kludged together something based on the very '90s "Dim'Azzin" from Creatures of Tharkold.

"How 90's could it be," he said to himself as he opened Creatures of Tharkold... "oh."

mathey wrote:The ones I came up with were not as EXTREME!!! as all that, but were still real tough - I wanted to try an opponent with the suggested Beta Clearance skill range, but high defenses + high armor = long, drawn out combat. I ended up fudging the creature's Wounds to wrap things up after the Glory:

If I had it to do over again, I'd drop the TOU, Melee Weapons, or Unarmed Combat down - maybe all three. Ah well. Live and learn.

Thanks. Those are some very high across-the-board combat defenses, although it does have a few so-so interactions (trick and intimidate are good but maybe not so great against Beta characters?). And the high reality skill means it has a good chance to soak a Wound that gets through. I can see how it would be a frustrating fight; I've done that sort of thing before in other systems where I was hoping to challenge the players and got an un-fun slog instead.

There's an interesting inter-play between attack skills, defenses, damage, and toughness in TE, it seems to me. Unarmed/melee characters have ways of stacking up damage but ranged attackers have fewer options; most ranged perks allow for re-rolling BD but the only perk to add BD requires sacrificing an action. So boosting ranged damage is mainly through higher skill and teamwork, options which are also available to melee types. I guess what that means is at higher clearances, if Toughness is high then dodge shouldn't be? Maybe? Looking at the 5th planting gospog seems to back that up, neither the NE or LL 5ths have any ranks in dodge but quite high melee/unarmed values.

The Storm Knights put their plan to uproot the Naissaar stela into action.

Regrouping with their allies and equipping themselves, the Knights return to the shores of Naissaar in a night raid. They sneak further inland with their allies from the Race resistance cell led by the psychic Cyra, carefully following Kash’s lead to avoid Russian Thrall patrols. They wait in the shadow of the three pipelines until Olivia’s earlier programmed steam vent test occurs, shooting a haze of superheated water vapor into the sky near the island shale factory. The distraction works perfectly, drawing Volkov’s soldiers away from the stela field as they check on the dramatic steam jet.

With an Estonian minesweeper and Thorvald the Viking’s longships in place, William calls Delphi Council command and gives the go ahead for an airstrike targeting the docks on the Eastern edge of the island. The team listens to the radio chatter as the unseen fighter jet deploys its devastating payload over the Russian Navy vessels docked there, causing a shattering blast that is visible from near and wide. The Vikings begin making their landing amid the confusion, accompanied by the Cyberpapacy hacker Antonin Dufek. As the raging Ayslish clash with the Russian forces, Dufek goes for the control room to start countering security drones on behalf of the Knights.

The Storm Knight’s unit moves to the open field where the black carapace of the Tharkold stela is standing, surrounded by vine-covered pods containing numerous Gospog. The island’s lighthouse stands nearby to the north, casting a rotating beam of light across the Gulf of Finland. Kash targets the oil drums that were set up around the Gospog field and fires flaming arrows at them, lighting the clearing in an orange haze of burning fuel. The circle of flame destroys many of the still-slumbering Gospog, and the team leaps through the fire to get nearer to the stela. A few of Cyra’s people are singed by the flames but William quickly aids them with expert field medicine.

Kash faces the grotesque biotechno device at the heart of the burning circle, calling on his goddess Lanala to help uproot the thing out of the Earth. Large vines snake around the base of the stela and begin to lift it up from the ground, but it is slow going. Gospog arise from the grass nearby, safe from the fire that is decimating their kin outside of the circle. Oswyn quickly engages them in close combat, trying to keep them from reaching the Edeinos warrior. Sigma works occultech spells which cause even the mindless undead to feel something akin to fear, causing them to cringe and cower. William hangs back near Cyra and her team near the surrounding wall of heat, firing on the Gospog from a short distance away with his hunter’s gun. Olivia keeps a position overhead with her rocketpack, sending deadly rays of electrical energy into the scattered undead.

Sigma finds his slashers are not doing quite enough harm to cut down the Gospog, so he quickly draws his seldom-used submachine gun - remembers to take off the safety - and sprays two of them with a burst that returns to them to the ground. Oswyn cuts down several more of the plant creatures, getting closer behind Kash to block attacks on his back with sword and shield. The small initial group of Gospog that first rose up are reinforced by dimthreads that pull more of their kin to the fight, teleporting them into the immediate vicinity. Cyra’s group provides covering fire and psychic blasts which help the Knights’ attacks finish off yet more of the monsters.

Kash continues focusing on bending the reality that anchors the stela in place, and as he does he can sense that there is a thinking mind connected to it, one which seems to recognize him personally. He hears a loud explosion nearby as William flings a “dragon’s breath” mixture he had prepared - with some extra napalm - at the Gospog affected by Sigma’s Tharkold magic. The Orrorshan begins explaining his satisfaction with the resulting heatwash and burnt monsters, but Olivia cuts him off, noting she is less than thrilled to hear he was casually experimenting with jellied gasoline, especially since it has only made one section of the fiery circle even more intense.

As the stela rises up from the ground, its hideous roots losing purchase in the field, there is another defender sent to try and stop Kash’s progress - a red-skinned, leathery winged Ravagon. Sigma quickly responds to the new arrival with a long occultech dart that shoots out of his body and into the side of the Ravagon, piercing its skin and sinking inside. The strange attack bears away some of the speed and agility of the creature, weakening it as it engages the party. The creature lands near the Edeinos’ back, but Oswyn is there to block with his shield, preventing it from sinking its talons in Kash’s jugular. The Paladin of Dunad holds off two Gospog at the same time until they join all the others in being shot, slashed, or zapped into oblivion.

With the drained Ravagon trying to battle the other Knights alone, Kash is able to finish rending the stela’s connection to Tharkold, breaking its shell with the entwined vines of Lanala. The destruction of the stela sends a sudden ripple of possibility energy up and outward in a wave, accompanied by flashing red and blue lightning. Seeing their objective completed, Olivia preps a liquid nitrogen gadget that sprays a section of the firewall and puts out the flames, opening a gap the team can escape through.

A handful of off-road vehicles bearing Volkov’s Thralls begin to arrive to the field, but Olivia flings a grenade which lands in their midst, blowing up one load of soldiers and causing another vehicle to wreck. William has some sour grapes about the gadgeteer not being criticized for her explosion like he just was for his napalm-concoction.

The desperate Ravagon tries to continue the battle, but it is already wounded when the stela is shattered. It reaches out a clawed hand to wrest Oswyn’s magic blade from his grip when the Paladin feels his connection to Dunad fail him, but before it can turn the weapon on its former wielder, Sigma shatters its resolve with a scornful comment about its futile effort. Cowed at last, the Ravagon takes to the sky, taking the knight’s sword with it as it flees, promising revenge.

Boarding two of the intact buggies left by the scattered Thralls, the Storm Knights quickly make for the wrecked docks and then join their allies in sailing away from the island.

Later, the victorious heroes take some time to enjoy the adulation of the Estonian people and consider the changes their success has wrought in the local landscape.

Sigma settles down to eat some Core Earth fast food and snacks, enjoying the flavors on hand while not having to worry about his health thanks to the efficiency of his occultech implants.

Oswyn goes to Tallinn’s old city and visits a local blacksmith, getting him to craft him a new sword. The Paladin tells a small audience of onlookers about his recent battle against the Ravagon, getting the smith to engrave his new weapon with an image of the event.

William speaks with his former Thralls, guiding them in the ways of gardening now that the Tharkold reality has retreated from the area. He also gets a letter from his fiancee Glenda, who writes from Delhi to tell him about a local women’s circle which is dabbling in seances. He writes back to tell her to not engage with the dark arts, warning her that even innocent rituals can have deadly consequences.

Prince Erik visits the Baltic Sea aboard his yacht and invites Olivia for a pleasure cruise. They chat about the recent transformation of the southern coast back to Core Earth terrain, and enjoy some time away from the Possibility Wars.

Kash goes around preaching about Lanala and saying that the Living Land should be allowed to continue to co-exist on Core Earth. His fellow Delphi Council agent Blake approaches him eventually and offers his opinion that places like North America should be freed of any invading cosm, friendly or not, but the two part on friendly terms.

With this brief respite finished, the Storm Knights begin preparing to travel to the Canavese region of Italy to investigate rumors of the Ex-Cardinal Babin’s activities as a rampaging cyber-werewolf. The Victorian monster hunter Colonel Hastings is already in Turin and has asked to meet with them to discuss what he’s learned. The Corsican witch Bianca also wishes to be involved, as she is Babin’s foe and also the cause of his current curse….